Celebrate Chinese New Year in style with very realistic, koi-shaped tikoy (nian kao) from the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, Makati. Tikoy is a milky Chinese rice cake dipped in egg and fried, but Mandarin Oriental has the best tikoy among all those I’ve tried. Presentation-wise, it’s already quite a thing to behold, but what makes the koi-shaped tikoy so divine is that doesn’t absorb oil the way tikoy from the streets do. The result is a soft, chewy pastry that almost melts in your mouth and travels smoothly down your throat as you shiver in delight.
The Chinese believe that tikoy must be offered to the kitchen god a week before the Chinese new year so that the god can give them a favorable testimonial upon their death. According to their beliefs, the more tikoy you offer, the more the god’s mouth will be filled with the sticky sweet cake to say anything bad towards you. I’d really rather eat the tikoy myself, though!
For mothers, the first ‘battle’ of the day starts right at the breakfast table. Almost every mother is faced with the day-to-day challenge of preparing a healthy yet appealing and appetizing breakfast for her children before they head off for school. More often than not, children are picky at the breakfast table, probably because they have yet to shake off the last traces of sleep, plus the anxieties of the morning rush. 
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